Update: As violence escalates, Libya cuts off the Internet
By Robert McMillan - February 18, 2011 10:14 PM ET

IDG News Service - With violence escalating, Libya is pulling the plug on its Internet connection.

Libya's main Internet service provider, General Post and Telecommunications Company, began to cut Internet access on Friday, said Earl Zmijewski, general manager with Internet monitoring company Renesys. "They started pulling the plug around 23:18 UTC today and are currently largely off the air," he said via e-mail. That was 1:18 a.m. Saturday, local time.

Libya appears to be taking its cue from Egypt, which cut off all Internet access at the end of January as it was roiled by street protests calling for political reform.

In similar fashion, thousands of Libyans took to the streets in the city of Benghazi this week in protests that have led to 46 killings in the past three days, according to Amnesty International.

As the situation has escalated, Internet traffic has been cut, making it difficult to get a picture of the situation on the ground.

Libya is much smaller than Egypt, with fewer networks to unplug, and it appears that this has made the job of cutting Internet access much simpler.

Agence France Press reported Friday that Facebook was inaccessible from Tripoli, Libya's capital, and that "access to the Internet was intermittent."

Where once he spoke out against US imperialism in particular when they tried to bomb him in his sleep, Gaddaff since the Iraq war has sided with the USA.

Allegedly according to Press TV Blair is on his payroll so he must have learnt that they way to put down a rebellion is to use helicopter gunships against you own people as is alleged to be occurring in Libyas 2nd city.

If 300 are dead as they report, there wont be much left and if Gaddafi doesn't go the country will split as they will march on the capital to get him.

Tony Blair our very special adviser by dictator Gaddafi's sonBy Nabila Ramdani, Tim Shipman and Peter Allen
Last updated at 4:40 AM on 5th June 2010
Comments (44) Add to My Stories Tony Blair has become an adviser to Colonel Gaddafi, the Libyan dictator's son has sensationally claimed.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi said the former prime minister has secured a consultancy role with a state fund that manages the country's £65billion of oil wealth.
In an exclusive interview, Saif described Mr Blair as a 'personal family friend' of the Libyan leader and said he had visited the country 'many, many times' since leaving Downing Street three years ago.
Personal friends? Tony Blair meets Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi at his desert base
If true, the claims will plunge Mr Blair - now a Middle East peace envoy - into a fresh row over potential conflicts of interest between his public and private roles.
His business affairs have attracted widespread controversy because they are deliberately shrouded in secrecy.
Last night, families of the 270 Lockerbie victims accused Mr Blair of breaking bread with people who 'have blood on their hands'.
They have in the past raised questions about Mr Blair's relationship with Colonel Gaddafi especially over a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya that paved the way for the return of the Lockerbie bomber last year.
Saif made clear that the agreement - drawn up when Mr Blair was prime minister - was key to creating a 'special relationship' between Britain and Libya.
Saif suggested Mr Blair was involved in 'Africa projects' with his father, alleging: 'He also has some consultancy role with the Libyan Investment Authority.'
Mr Blair was adamant last night he had no relationship whatsoever with the LIA. However he is advising several firms seeking a slice of the massive revenues from Libya's oil reserves.
Saif, speaking in his private suite in Mayfair's five star Connaught Hotel, said: 'Tony Blair has an excellent relationship with my father.
'For us, he is a personal family friend. I first met him around four years ago at Number 10. Since then I've met him several times in Libya where he stays with my father. He has come to Libya many, many times.

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'He's adviser to the LIA, the Libyan Investment Authority. He has some consultancy role.' Saif defended Mr Blair's right to exploit his contacts in Libya.
'Many people are unhappy with him [Blair] because of Iraq,' he said. 'It's much easier to deal with the LIA than the Middle East. Tony Blair has the right to earn money.
'It's a good thing to be a businessman. The LIA is ready to talk to anybody who wants to do business in Libya.'
Last night, Mr Blair's spokesman said: 'Tony Blair does not have any role, either formal or informal, paid or unpaid, with the Libyan Investment Authority or the government of Lybia.
'He has an excellent relationship with my father''He has no commercial relationship with any Libyan companies or any Libyan projects in Africa.'
But sources close to the Gaddafi family said Saif - tipped to succeed his father as leader of his country - stands by his comments.
Colonel Gaddafi is understood to be on first name terms with Mr Blair, who saw his work in Libya as one of the great foreign policy successes of his premiership.
Mr Blair has always insisted he played no role in the return of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi, who was sent home last August by the Scottish government on compassionate grounds after doctors wrongly said he had only three months to live.
But Saif said Megrahi's release was 'always on the negotiating table' in discussions about ' commercial contracts for oil and gas with Britain'.
Frank Duggan, president of the Victims of Pan Am Flight 103, told the Mail: 'If this is true, I guess this is Tony Blair's reward from the Libyan government for what he has done.
'It's important for world peace that Libya is brought back into the community of nations but that doesn't mean that you have to honour people with blood on their hands.'
Saif, 37, was a key player in Libya's bid to end its pariah status and renounce nuclear weapons.

That decision led to Mr Blair's trip to Tripoli in 2004, where he shook Colonel Gaddafi's hand and declared a 'new relationship'. The meeting led to lucrative Libyan oil contracts for Shell.
A month before stepping down as PM, Mr Blair visited-Colonel Gaddafi in Tripoli again at the same time that BP signed a $900million deal with the Libyan National Oil Company.
Saif said: 'Libya has a special relationship with Britain.'
Since becoming a part-time Middle East peace envoy on leaving office in 2007, Mr Blair has exploited his contacts to amass a personal fortune in excess of £20million.
He has a lucrative contract to advise JP Morgan, which pays him £2million a year. Part of his job for them is to develop banking opportunities in Libya. It is understood that British firms Mr Blair is linked to are also being given contracts to tap Libya's massive natural resources, and to help rebuild the country's outdated infrastructure.
The details are sketchy because he has built a labyrinthine business empire of interlocking partnerships designed, it seems, to conceal the sources and scale of his income.
Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski, who chairs the all-party Commons committee on Libya, said Mr Blair should spend more time on his role as a Middle East envoy than allegedly exploiting his links with the Gaddafi family.
He said: 'Mr Blair has a very important job. It does concern me greatly that he seems to spend so much time with the Libyans, who are not key players in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
'There should be greater transparency to ensure that Tony Blair is not using his current position and his previous position to assist his business interests.'
Sources close to Mr Blair said it was a matter of public record that he has visited Libya since leaving office, where he has discussed a range of issues.
They said he fully supported the decision to integrate Libya back into the international community and is proud of the role he played in the process.

The social web that connects the rich and powerfulSaif Gaddafi sits at the centre of a remarkable social web that has ensnared both Tony Blair and Lord Mandelson.
The men are bound together by their interests in Libyan business and their friendship with the multi-billionaire financiers of the Rothschild family.
Lord Mandelson once remarked that he was 'intensely relaxed' about extreme wealth, a position he has justified ever since. It was only natural that he should share an interest in networking and wealth with one of the world's oldest banking families.
But even the Rothschilds have probably never described him as a 'killer of a man'.
That was Saif Gaddafi's take on the former Business Secretary. After Labour's election defeat, Mr Gaddafi said: 'It's bad news for the UK that he left because he is a killer of a man. It's a loss for the UK.'
The two men met briefly last summer at the secluded cliff top mansion compound of the Rothschild family on the holiday island of Corfu.
Curiously, their stays overlapped by one night and came only a week before the announcement-that the perpetrator of the Lockerbie bombing could be released from prison.
They 'fleetingly' discussed the fate of the bomber Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi but Lord Mandelson's spokesman said he was ' completely unsighted' on the impending release.
Last November, Lord Mandelson spent more time in the company of Saif during a shooting weekend at Waddesdon Manor, Lord Rothschild's mini-Versailles in Buckinghamshire. Cherie Blair was also a guest.
Earlier this month, the former business secretary was seen zipping around the Swiss ski resort of Klosters in Nat Rothschild's £250,000 Ferrari convertible.
An Anglophile, Col Gaddafi's likely heir Saif studied

Libya protests: 140 'massacred' as Gaddafi sends in snipers to crush dissent
Women and children leapt from bridges to their deaths as they tried to escape a ruthless crackdown by Libyan forces loyal to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

Where once he spoke out against US imperialism in particular when they tried to bomb him in his sleep, Gaddaff since the Iraq war has sided with the USA.

Allegedly according to Press TV Blair is on his payroll so he must have learnt that they way to put down a rebellion is to use helicopter gunships against you own people as is alleged to be occurring in Libyas 2nd city.

If 300 are dead as they report, there wont be much left and if Gaddafi doesn't go the country will split as they will march on the capital to get him.

Mass murder after 40 years of rule means he is on his way out.

Quote:

Tony Blair our very special adviser by dictator Gaddafi's sonBy Nabila Ramdani, Tim Shipman and Peter Allen
Last updated at 4:40 AM on 5th June 2010
Comments (44) Add to My Stories Tony Blair has become an adviser to Colonel Gaddafi, the Libyan dictator's son has sensationally claimed.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi said the former prime minister has secured a consultancy role with a state fund that manages the country's £65billion of oil wealth.
In an exclusive interview, Saif described Mr Blair as a 'personal family friend' of the Libyan leader and said he had visited the country 'many, many times' since leaving Downing Street three years ago.
Personal friends? Tony Blair meets Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi at his desert base
If true, the claims will plunge Mr Blair - now a Middle East peace envoy - into a fresh row over potential conflicts of interest between his public and private roles.
His business affairs have attracted widespread controversy because they are deliberately shrouded in secrecy.
Last night, families of the 270 Lockerbie victims accused Mr Blair of breaking bread with people who 'have blood on their hands'.
They have in the past raised questions about Mr Blair's relationship with Colonel Gaddafi especially over a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya that paved the way for the return of the Lockerbie bomber last year.
Saif made clear that the agreement - drawn up when Mr Blair was prime minister - was key to creating a 'special relationship' between Britain and Libya.
Saif suggested Mr Blair was involved in 'Africa projects' with his father, alleging: 'He also has some consultancy role with the Libyan Investment Authority.'
Mr Blair was adamant last night he had no relationship whatsoever with the LIA. However he is advising several firms seeking a slice of the massive revenues from Libya's oil reserves.
Saif, speaking in his private suite in Mayfair's five star Connaught Hotel, said: 'Tony Blair has an excellent relationship with my father.
'For us, he is a personal family friend. I first met him around four years ago at Number 10. Since then I've met him several times in Libya where he stays with my father. He has come to Libya many, many times.

More...BP defers decision over dividend
Will Mandelson beat Blair and get his memoirs in the book stores first?

'He's adviser to the LIA, the Libyan Investment Authority. He has some consultancy role.' Saif defended Mr Blair's right to exploit his contacts in Libya.
'Many people are unhappy with him [Blair] because of Iraq,' he said. 'It's much easier to deal with the LIA than the Middle East. Tony Blair has the right to earn money.
'It's a good thing to be a businessman. The LIA is ready to talk to anybody who wants to do business in Libya.'
Last night, Mr Blair's spokesman said: 'Tony Blair does not have any role, either formal or informal, paid or unpaid, with the Libyan Investment Authority or the government of Lybia.
'He has an excellent relationship with my father''He has no commercial relationship with any Libyan companies or any Libyan projects in Africa.'
But sources close to the Gaddafi family said Saif - tipped to succeed his father as leader of his country - stands by his comments.
Colonel Gaddafi is understood to be on first name terms with Mr Blair, who saw his work in Libya as one of the great foreign policy successes of his premiership.
Mr Blair has always insisted he played no role in the return of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi, who was sent home last August by the Scottish government on compassionate grounds after doctors wrongly said he had only three months to live.
But Saif said Megrahi's release was 'always on the negotiating table' in discussions about ' commercial contracts for oil and gas with Britain'.
Frank Duggan, president of the Victims of Pan Am Flight 103, told the Mail: 'If this is true, I guess this is Tony Blair's reward from the Libyan government for what he has done.
'It's important for world peace that Libya is brought back into the community of nations but that doesn't mean that you have to honour people with blood on their hands.'
Saif, 37, was a key player in Libya's bid to end its pariah status and renounce nuclear weapons.

That decision led to Mr Blair's trip to Tripoli in 2004, where he shook Colonel Gaddafi's hand and declared a 'new relationship'. The meeting led to lucrative Libyan oil contracts for Shell.

A month before stepping down as PM, Mr Blair visited-Colonel Gaddafi in Tripoli again at the same time that BP signed a $900million deal with the Libyan National Oil Company.
Saif said: 'Libya has a special relationship with Britain.'
Since becoming a part-time Middle East peace envoy on leaving office in 2007, Mr Blair has exploited his contacts to amass a personal fortune in excess of £20million.
He has a lucrative contract to advise JP Morgan, which pays him £2million a year. Part of his job for them is to develop banking opportunities in Libya. It is understood that British firms Mr Blair is linked to are also being given contracts to tap Libya's massive natural resources, and to help rebuild the country's outdated infrastructure.
The details are sketchy because he has built a labyrinthine business empire of interlocking partnerships designed, it seems, to conceal the sources and scale of his income.
Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski, who chairs the all-party Commons committee on Libya, said Mr Blair should spend more time on his role as a Middle East envoy than allegedly exploiting his links with the Gaddafi family.
He said: 'Mr Blair has a very important job. It does concern me greatly that he seems to spend so much time with the Libyans, who are not key players in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
'There should be greater transparency to ensure that Tony Blair is not using his current position and his previous position to assist his business interests.'
Sources close to Mr Blair said it was a matter of public record that he has visited Libya since leaving office, where he has discussed a range of issues.
They said he fully supported the decision to integrate Libya back into the international community and is proud of the role he played in the process.

The social web that connects the rich and powerfulSaif Gaddafi sits at the centre of a remarkable social web that has ensnared both Tony Blair and Lord Mandelson.
The men are bound together by their interests in Libyan business and their friendship with the multi-billionaire financiers of the Rothschild family.
Lord Mandelson once remarked that he was 'intensely relaxed' about extreme wealth, a position he has justified ever since. It was only natural that he should share an interest in networking and wealth with one of the world's oldest banking families.
But even the Rothschilds have probably never described him as a 'killer of a man'.
That was Saif Gaddafi's take on the former Business Secretary. After Labour's election defeat, Mr Gaddafi said: 'It's bad news for the UK that he left because he is a killer of a man. It's a loss for the UK.'
The two men met briefly last summer at the secluded cliff top mansion compound of the Rothschild family on the holiday island of Corfu.
Curiously, their stays overlapped by one night and came only a week before the announcement-that the perpetrator of the Lockerbie bombing could be released from prison.
They 'fleetingly' discussed the fate of the bomber Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi but Lord Mandelson's spokesman said he was ' completely unsighted' on the impending release.
Last November, Lord Mandelson spent more time in the company of Saif during a shooting weekend at Waddesdon Manor, Lord Rothschild's mini-Versailles in Buckinghamshire. Cherie Blair was also a guest.
Earlier this month, the former business secretary was seen zipping around the Swiss ski resort of Klosters in Nat Rothschild's £250,000 Ferrari convertible.
An Anglophile, Col Gaddafi's likely heir Saif studied

All foreign companies and all French schools are pulling out their staff.

Gaddafi went for broke called out mercenaries his son called all protestors drunken hooligans and foreign infiltration and he has provoked an insurrection where the army has split.

Once the army has split relying on foreign mercenaries will be very difficult as Arabs who have died from their relatives point of view will not let the issue rest.

All the military awards he has won, for doing precisely what no one knows cos he has never fought Israel, are now being used to put down the people. If he dont watch it Gadaffi could be hanging from a lampost soon, Mussolini style.

Saif al-Islam Photo: JONATHAN LODGE9:27PM BST 22 Aug 2009
Save perhaps for his fondness for pet tigers, Saif al-Islam could be said to enjoy much in common with Lord Mandelson, who he met at the Rothschild family estate in Corfu only days before the release of the Lockerbie bomber.

Yet as he escorted Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi back home to Libya on a private jet last week, the 37-year-old son of Colonel Gaddafi showed he also has his father's ability for mischief making.

In a TV broadcast recorded on the plane, he sparked a new row between Britain and Libya by claiming that the release of the Pan Am culprit had indeed been linked to lucrative business deals - despite Downing Street's insistence that it was purely a matter for the Scottish government.

"It is to be said for the first time, you were present on the table in all commercial, oil and gas agreements that we supervised in that period," he told Megrahi, as the pair sat together in the private jet's luxury lounge. "You were on the table in all British interests when it came to Libya, and I personally supervised this matter."

His comments, which were released late on Friday night, were recorded for Libya's Al Motawasset TV, a new channel launched by Saif al-Islam only a few days ago. Given his roving role at the centre of Libyan politics, it may not be the last political "exclusives" that he has to offer.

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With every step that the North African state has taken to end its pariah status, he has played a central role - be it the talks to end Libya's secret nuclear programme, recent prisoner releases, or lucrative trade deals. His fluent English, and ability to act as the acceptable face of the Gaddafi family, has seen him cultivate a dazzling array of contacts, ranging from the Duke of York and Lord Mandelson through to American billionaires, yacht-owners and party hosts.

Born the second oldest of seven of Col Gaddafi's sons, the young Saif al-Islam experienced the international hostility to his father's regime at first hand, losing a four-year-old sister to a US missile attack on the family home in Tripoli in 1984. But in keeping with the unpredictable nature of his father's regime, he grew not into a fellow revolutionary firebrand, nor a spoilt Arab playboy, but as an earnest young man with an interest in progressive politics and the reform of his country.

Eight years after 1984 shooting of WPC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan embassy in London, for which Libya has accepted responsibility, he began a part-time PhD in governance and international relations at the London School of Economics. Explaining his decision to buy a flat in London in 2002, he said his outcast father would not meet the cost of long stays at top hotels. "Living at Claridge's is not an option," he told an interviewer.

A designer and painter, he also has an architecture degree from Al-Fateh University in Tripoli as well as a Masters in business from Imadec University in Vienna. While his main residence remains Col Gaddafi's military compound in Tripoli, he also has a farm outside the city, where he keeps two pet tigers.

In contrast to his father, when once acted as a bankroller for the IRA and numerous other terrorist groups, Saif al-Islam has channeled cash into humanitarian causes as chair of the wealthy Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation, which devotes itself to "development and humanitarian work in social , economic, cultural and human rights fields". Only last month, it signed an agreement with his alma mater, the LSE, t donate £1.5 million to the university over the next five years.

However, while he has long been tipped as the man to take over from his father, Saif al-Islam declared uin 2008 that he had no interest in "inheriting" his reign, claiming that he would withdraw from formal politics altogether.

"My role now is to build a civilized society that has free and genuine institutions, just ties and organizations, and unions," he declared. Despite his avowed intentions, however, critics say Libya's human rights record remains poor. As a Western diplomat in Tripoli told The Sunday Telegraph earlier this year: "There are still serious limits to freedom of speech and political activism here, and threats to the regime are dealt with severely."

Saif al Islam's last big brokering act was the release in 2007 of six Bulgarian nurses who spent eight years in a Libyan prison charged with infecting children with the HIV virus. The other partner in the deal was France's Nicolas Sarkozy, for whom it was an early diplomatic coup. The gloss was somewhat taken off, however, when Saif al-Islam subsequently revealed the handover was linked to the sale of anti-tank missiles and a radio communications system to Libya. Whatever his diplomatic talents, discretion is perhaps not one of them - as Gordon Brown may now well be feeling.

Talking to an actual Libyan living here in Bristol who is in touch with friends in Tripoli by phone - the Libyan Air Force has absolutely NOT been attacking any civilians.
Ths is a lie apparently fed through Al Jazeera to the western media. He has checked this with two of his Libyan friends by phone.

He says we cannot believe ANY media on the Libya 'uprising' right now.

Looks to me that the action in Egypt and Tunisia may have been used as an opportunity for the west to use covert ops to topple Gaddafi.

The uprising in Libya started when gangs attacked a police station and prisons to free their criminal friends then going on to burn the court files so records of their crimes would be destroyed.

The Nato Plan Is To Occupy Libya
Reflections by Comrade Fidel
Oil has become the principal wealth in the hands of the great Yankee transnationals; through this energy source they had an instrument that considerably expanded their political power in the world. It was their main weapon when they decided to easily liquidate the Cuban Revolution as soon as the first just and sovereign laws were passed in our Homeland: depriving it of oil.
http://www.cubanews.ain.cu/2011/0221the-nato-plan-is-to-occupy-libya.h tm

Jazeera Disinformation: Truth About Libya's Ambassador to Bangladesh
Posted: 2011/02/23
http://www.mathaba.net/news/?x=626040
Mathaba correspondent and Libyan ambassador to Bangladesh, Ahmed Hamed Elimam: Resigned his position in the Libyan government then followed a barrage of disinformation from Jazeera satellite TV and Bangladesh media
Late on Monday, Ahmed Attia Hamed Elimam, Libya's ambassador to Bangladesh, resigned his position as an ambassador for Libya's foreign ministry.
Jazeera, based in Qatar a U.S. client state in the Arabian Gulf, and which never criticises the Qatari regime nor it's subservience as a U.S. outpost for the Arab Gulf region, said this was in protest against the killing of his family members by government soldiers. This is not true, and is part of a widespread campaign of disinformation by Jazeera and other MSM networks which the Gaddafi family have themselves failed to address...

A colonial oil grab is underway in Libya shielded by propaganda. Why are planes bombing civilians in Tripoli but not Banghazi? Libyan human rights are bad, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Libya, but not as bad as we are told. Anti-government protesters have taken over the East – where most oil fields are. Talk of genocide allows UN-supported foreign intervention and the annexation of oil fields.

A BBC Radio 4 Today report from a UK oil worker in his Libyan compound did not fit the story we are being told. He said he was trapped in the compound with other workers. They all feared for their lives. Their vehicles had been stolen by local people. And local people were armed with AK47s.

The Muslim Brotherhood is also active in Libya. This suggests that there was an armed insurrection in the East where the main aim was to secure the oil fields for the West. Nonetheless, there appears to be a good deal of popular backing for anti-Gaddaffi action - although, this may be because people in the East were promised that they would have their own oil-rich country.

… One can agree with Gaddafi or not. The world has been invaded with all kinds of news, especially using the mass media. One has to wait the necessary length of time in order to learn precisely what is the truth and what are lies, or a mixture of events of every kind that, in the midst of chaos, were produced in Libya. For me, what is absolutely clear is that the government of the United States is not in the least worried about peace in Libya and it will not hesitate in giving NATO the order to invade that rich country, perhaps in a matter of hours or a few short days…

Maltese are Cross!
Malta turns back Gaadafi's only daughter.
Despite having allowed Libyan Mirages to land.
If you're part of the coup you can land if not you can go hang... seems to be the Maltese foreign policy.
I guess they know she can't get to Venezuela non-stop.

Malta turns back 'Gaddafi daughter's jet'
Plane carrying Ayse Gaddafi attempts to land but is forced to turn back after being denied permission.
AlJazeera - Wed 23 Feb 2011 17:45 GMT
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/02/2011223164125540203.h tml
The plane reportedly carrying Gaddafi's daughter circled overhead Malta before being turned back
A Libyan plane reportedly carrying the daughter of Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's leader, has been turned back from Malta after it was denied permission to land.
"The [crew] initially said they had 14 people on board. They were circling overhead saying they were running low on fuel," Cal Perry, Al Jazeera's correspondent in Malta, said.
"At that point the ambassador from Libya who was here in Malta was called in to take part in the negotiations on whether or not they were going to allow this plane to land.
"As he entered the talks it became clear from the pilots that Ayse Gaddhafi, Muammar Gaddhafi's only daughter, was aboard the plane. The government said it was an unscheduled flight, it doesn't matter who is on board; they said it cannot land and diverted the plane back to Libya."
Libya has been in turmoil since mass protests broke out against Gaddafi's 42-year-old rule in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi more than a week ago.
The protests, which have spread to other cities despite the authorities cracking down on the protesters, is the biggest challenge that Gaddafi has faced during his long rule. The protesters now control much of the country and many senior officials have deserted Gaddafi.

Info directly from UK resident with family in the city says it was sparked when police stations were set on fire. Police were given orders from government not to fight back, but mob then went on to Al Bayda jail, released their criminal friends, burned their files in the city court house and went on to attack the HQ of the national security police.
At that point the regime gave orders to fight back and that's when there was first bloodshed.
This info is from a UK resident born in Al Bayda muchof whose family is there and he has managed to speak to them an other Libyans on the phone.

...In another blow to the Libyan leader, his former justice minister, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, who stepped down this week, was quoted as saying today that Gaddafi personally ordered the Lockerbie bombing, in which 270 people were killed. ...

?_________________"We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl

"Rothschilds Stage Revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt To Kill Islamic Banks In Emerging North African Markets"

Quote:

Islamic banks have been eating into Rothschild profits in the Middle East because: they don’t charge interest (Shariah Law), they are growing very rapidly among the world’s exploding Muslim populations, and (in these catastrophic economic times) they are more stable than western banks.

While it is a very good thing that people are freed from the tyranny of dictators, they also need to be freed from the tyranny of economic control and serfdom. The relevant moral question is: Do the means justify the end?. ... ... ...

and

Quote:

... ... ...NED and Soros have been injecting millions of dollars into the training of North African, pro-democracy teachers, lawyers, journalists and youth activists. In 2009 they more than doubled their training efforts. Why, at this time, has the 30-year support of these dictators been undermined? The prize is the rapidly-rising economies of North Africa. It coincides with the efforts of Ben Ali to make Tunisia the financial center of North Africa and to promote Islamic banking. The Rothschilds want North African Muslims to borrow from Rothschild banks and pay interest at rates the Rothschild central bank decides: they do not want them to be able to borrow from Islamic banks and not pay any interest. The Rothschilds want Muslims to trade their present political oppression at the hands of brutal dictators for future economic serfdom under the control of banker Lord Rothschild. ... ... ...

Can any of you tell me just why this situation continues to be tolerated by devout, non-usurious Christians, please? Why are you not devoting your time to securing justice against these parasites who feed off the energy of you and your brethren?_________________"We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl

Gaddafi in a message today was blaming AlCIAda and Bin Laden for the unrest as well as youth high on drugs. He is singing from the right (terror) hymn sheet but in the wrong scene of the play._________________JO911B.
"for we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against wicked spirits in high places " Eph.6 v 12

Saif, the president's second-eldest son, runs a charity called the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation.

It has sent hundreds of tons of aid to Haiti. (Gaddafi's sons and their lavish spending)

Saif "has extremely powerful friends in Britain, among them Prince Andrew and the Rothschilds as well as Peter Mandelson." (Gaddafi heir Saif inevitably is a friend of Andy and Mandy)

Saif did a PhD at the London School of Economics, a place that reportedly recruits spies.

Saif and Prince Andrew "have a mutual close friend, the Kazakh-born socialite and businesswoman Goga Ashkenazy."

Nat and Saif and Nat Rothschild "have a friend in common, Oleg Deripaska." (Gaddafi heir Saif inevitably is a friend of Andy and Mandy )

Sa'adi, third-eldest son, has been a professional footballer and has had problems with drugs and alcohol. (WikiLeaks cables: A guide to Gaddafi's 'famously fractious' family.)

Mutassim Gaddafi, the fourth son, is currently National Security Advisor.

He spent years in Egypt after allegedly plotting to oust his father. (France24 - The Gaddafi family tree)

Ayesha, a Gaddafi daughter, joined the defence team of the fake Saddam Hussein.

She is a 'UN Goodwill Ambassador'.

The Land Destroyer blog (The Middle East & then the World) reports that the CIA plans are revealed in the RAND Corporation's 2007 report entitled "Building Moderate Muslim Networks" and the Brookings Institute's "Which Path to Persia?".

The chief targets are still Russia and China.

And they have already been infiltrated.

According to Land Destroyer:

"Men like Mikhail Khodorkovsky ... began building networks of NGOs modeled directly after those of the Anglo-Americans in the West, even naming this network the 'Open Russian Foundation' after George Soros' Open Society Foundation.

"According to geopolitical researcher William Engdahl, this Open Russian Foundation included Henry Kissinger and Lord Jacob Rothschild on its board of directors and its goal was to transform Russia from a sovereign state and into something more palatable for globalist consumption."

US and Europe weigh up Libyan intervention as oil prices spike
By Patrick O’Connor
24 February 2011
The Obama administration and its European counterparts are coordinating a more aggressive stance toward Libya, including possible military intervention, in response to fears of an international oil price shock. With Libya’s daily oil output reduced by an estimated 50-60 percent, oil has surged to its highest price in more than two years, at nearly $110 a barrel. Stock markets have fallen in the US, Europe and Asia over fears that further price hikes may trigger inflation and slow economic activity.

The overriding concern of the imperialist powers is to re-establish stability in the North African state and resume the flow of oil exports. The various criticisms levelled by the Western leaders against the Libyan government’s brutal violence are utterly hypocritical—Muammar Gaddafi has enjoyed the warmest of relations with the US and Europe over the past decade. His regime was funded and armed by these powers, rewarding its support for Washington’s geo-strategic objectives in the region and collaboration with the foreign oil companies permitted into Libya. Many senior political and business figures have enriched themselves by working with Gaddafi, notably former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who was a frequent visitor to Tripoli on behalf of US investment bank JPMorgan Chase.

Now, however, the government in Tripoli appears on the verge of collapse as opposition forces extend their control from the eastern part of the country to western urban centres near the capital.

US President Barack Obama spoke on the Libyan crisis for the first time last night, declaring that he had “asked my administration to prepare the full range of options that we have to respond to this crisis”. In a similar threat of military force, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton earlier said Washington would examine “all possible options” and “everything will be on the table”. (See “Obama and the Libyan crisis”)

Yesterday, ahead of an emergency meeting of the UN Human Rights Council, a draft resolution issued by the European Union (EU) condemned “the recent extremely grave human rights violations committed in Libya, including extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, detention and torture of peaceful demonstrators, which if widespread and systematic, may amount to crimes against humanity”. This reference to crimes against humanity is significant—the same pretext was utilised for the NATO-led interventions in the Balkans in the 1990s.

Pseudo-legal cover for a potential intervention is already being prepared through the UN. A unanimous Security Council resolution was adopted Tuesday, condemning the violence and “underscoring the need to hold to account those responsible for attacks, including by forces under their control, on civilians”.

The US and European powers are reportedly preparing a range of diplomatic and economic sanctions against Libya. French President Nicolas Sarkozy declared: “The international community cannot remain a spectator to these massive violations of human rights.” He called for the imposition of a NATO-policed “no fly” zone over Libya. This comes just weeks after the Sarkozy administration moved to have French riot police help former Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali crush the revolt that sparked the unfolding revolution across North Africa and the Middle East.

The possible creation of a no fly zone over Libya is being discussed internationally. Concerns have been raised in the US and Britain over the chances of having Russia and China approve this measure through the UN Security Council. Several media reports have ominously noted that Washington, London and others are taking a “cautious” public stance on the matter until their diplomats and citizens are evacuated from Libya.

This mass evacuation is being accompanied by a substantial military build-up in the Mediterranean that could later be utilised as part of any US-NATO military operation in Libya. Britain, Turkey and Greece have deployed naval warships, and several countries have sent military planes, including France, Holland, Ukraine, Ireland and Italy.

Any US-led intervention would be primarily aimed not at halting of the brutal violence being unleashed by Gaddafi’s forces, but rather resuming Libya’s oil production. Foreign oil companies, including Italy’s Eni, Spain’s Repsol YPF, Germany’s Wintershall and France’s Total, have either shut down production or cut back substantially. Foreign industry experts and subcontractors are trying to flee the country.

The extent of production maintained at oilfields operated by Libya’s state oil company is unknown, and it is also unclear whether reported oil workers’ strikes are continuing. The Financial Times yesterday reported: “According to traders, Libya’s national oil company has declared force majeure—a legal clause allowing it to walk away from contracted deliveries—on refined products.”

Libya’s total daily production—previously 1.6 million barrels—represents less than 2 percent of total world oil output. The disproportionate impact of the Libyan oil crisis on international markets is due to several factors.

One is that Libyan oil is of a very high quality, and cannot simply be substituted by Saudi Arabia and other OPEC members increasing production. “The reservoirs beneath its desert landscape yield crudes that are easily refined into diesel and petrol and also low in sulphur, making them cleaner to burn,” the Financial Times explained. “They [oil companies] would need to find barrels of equivalent quality from Algeria, Nigeria, the Caspian region or the North Sea. The bidding could further raise prices for the kinds of high-quality crudes that underpin benchmark oil futures contracts and reduce fuel output from refineries unable to afford them.”

The Libyan uprising has also sparked fears on financial markets of the instability of other oil producers, including Algeria and Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil exporter. “No one knows where this ends,” Helima Croft, a director at Barclays Capital, told the New York Times. “A couple of weeks ago it was Tunisia and Egypt, and it was thought this can be contained to North Africa and the resource-poor Middle East countries. But now with protests in Bahrain, that’s the heart of the gulf, and it’s adding to anxieties.”

In an effort to allay such concerns, Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz has announced a $36 billion spending program directed toward employment, housing and other social issues, aimed at pre-empting any movement by Saudi Arabian workers and youth.

Commodity analysts at Japanese bank Nomura have warned of the possibility of oil prices hitting $220 a barrel, “if Libya and Algeria were to halt oil production together”. An oil price this high would inevitably trigger a sharp downturn in the American and world economies.

Libya’s oil fields, as with most of the country’s territory, now appear to be under the control of anti-Gaddafi forces.

In Benghazi and Bayda, Libya’s second and third largest cities, government forces seem to have been routed. International journalists are beginning to enter the area, crossing the border from Egypt. The Guardian’s Martin Chulov reported that in Benghazi “every physical sign of the dictator has been taken down or burned”. Old monarchy-era national flags were flying from government buildings. Soldiers who had defected had seized tonnes of weaponry and ammunition from military armouries.

Yesterday, opposition forces claimed control of Misrata, about 200 kilometres east of Tripoli, following days of street fighting. Faraj al-Misrati, a local doctor, told the Associated Press that six people had been killed and 200 wounded in the clashes. He added that residents had formed committees to clean the streets, protect the city and treat the injured. “The solidarity among the people here is amazing, even the disabled are helping out,” he said.

Opposition forces have said they control other urban centres in the western part of Libya, including Zawiya, just 50 kilometres west of the capital.

Inside Tripoli, reports continue to emerge of Gaddafi’s militia and foreign mercenary fighters massacring protestors and anyone regarded as an opponent of the regime. Video released on the internet showed these forces conducting house-to-house searches. Other footage appeared to show protestors using cement blocks and burning tyres as barricades around a square near the centre of the city. Demonstrations have been called for today and tomorrow, and there are reports of opposition plans to stage a “march” on Tripoli from other parts of the country on Friday.

US and Europe weigh up Libyan intervention as oil prices spike
By Patrick O’Connor
24 February 2011
The Obama administration and its European counterparts are coordinating a more aggressive stance toward Libya, including possible military intervention, in response to fears of an international oil price shock

.

The Anglo-American establishment seems to have done a 'good job' in Libya. There appears to be popular backing to getting rid of Gaddaffi even if some UK-based rebels on Newsnight don't appear to know why he should be removed. (When asked what should replace his regime, they were clueless. Freedom and dignity is what they said they wanted?? There is little evidence that he is an exceptionally brutal dictator.)

But the Anglo-American establishment WANT high oil prices. The notion that Libyan oil fields would be burned is probably their idea. The US wanted to get hold of Iraq oil but only to reduce supply and force prices up. This is what happened.

The West want to militarily intervene to 'secure' oil fields in the East and ensure that the regime is removed. They also want to suppress any post-Gaddaffi popular rebellion. Libyan oil supply could be replaced by increased Saudi production. Talk of Libya's 'special oil' is a red herring.

High oil prices will help to sustain the declining US dollar and support the ailing UK economy.

Libyan oil supply could be replaced by increased Saudi production. Talk of Libya's 'special oil' is a red herring.

I thought it was highly regarded especially for the production of plastics?

Back to who is enabling this co-ordinated spate of uprisings. Are we still all comfortable in thrall to the Rothschilds and their grandiose schemes which make a total nonsense of 'normal' human endeavour, morals, compassion and love for ones fellows, then?

If you're not keen on W.G.Carr's 'Pawns' maybe you would listen to Piers Compton at Catholic Voice instead?

President Obama issued a statement late on Wednesday indicating that he’s ordered his staff to review possible unilateral US actions in response to the Libyan government’s bloody efforts to suppress the countrywide revolt. These responses should not include the imposition of a so-called "no-fly zone" in the skies of the North African country.

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, has already demanded the imposition of a no-fly zone, a call (so far) rejected by the British.

Calls from various quarters are emerging for the United States to take the lead in imposing a no-fly zone inside Libya. Supporters include Elliott Abrams, the hard-edged neoconservative who was Middle East director for George W. Bush’s National Security Council, and various liberals in Congress, including two of the most outspoken anti-war representatives, Jim McDermott (D.-Wash) and Jim McGovern (D.-Mass.). Sarah Palin has chimed in, too. But it’s a really, really bad idea.

It’s dangerous: Like the no-fly zone in Iraq from 1991–2003, the enforcement of such a policy would be run by the United States and its junior partner, the British. It means war: a no-fly zone is worthless unless the United States is prepared to back it up with overwhelming military force.

It’s not needed: it isn’t clear that Libyan pilots are willing to bomb their own citizens. And, the revolution playing out in Libya isn’t likely to go on for months, or even weeks. Either Muammar Qaddafi surrenders or falls, or (far less likely) he somehow recovers to take control.

Yesterday, in a telephone call organized by the Council on Foreign Relations, Elliott Abrams proposed a series of radical steps designed to counter Qaddafi. He blasted President Obama for not doing enough. Some of his suggestions were reasonable enough: an arms embargo against Libya, for instance. But he endorsed calls for a no-fly zone, saying, "I don’t see any reason for us not to begin that conversation." He also suggested an oil embargo against Libya, which would only work if US warships were used to enforce it.

Sadly, Democrats in Congress are backing the no-fly zone idea, too. In a statement, McDermott, McGovern, Mike Honda (D.-Calif.), and Keith Ellison (D.-Minn.), all liberals, said: "We agree with Libya's deputy UN ambassador's call for an internationally enforced no-fly zone to be established over the country to prevent Gadhafi from using his air force against protesters." And Representative Howard Berman, an AIPAC ally who chaired the House Foreign Affairs Committee and who is a leading force on Capitol Hill in support of an oil embargo against Iran, added: "The international community should consider all measures to end the carnage, including the possible establishment of a no-fly zone to protect Libyan citizens."

While measures by the United States to sanction Libya, to condemn Qaddafi’s brutal actions in international forums and to cut off Libya’s arms supply—though, in practice, no one’s about to ship weapons to Libya now—are all good ideas, the United States needs to avoid anything that has warlike implications.

_________________'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'

“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”

... ... ...In Tunisia and Egypt the status quo prevails, the military machine and neo-liberalism remain intact; this works for the interests of the United States and the European Union. In Libya, however, upsetting the established order is a U.S. and E.U. objective.

_________________"We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl

... ... ...Hague, the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and the EU foreign affairs chief, Lady Ashton, are due to fly to Geneva on Monday to promote the case for prosecutions of Libyan leaders by the international criminal court. The foreign secretary said: "The message is clear: that there will be a day of reckoning for those guilty of the appalling atrocities. The world will act together to hold them to account."

Such measures were decried as paltry by some organisations calling for immediate action to stop the bloodshed. ... ... ...

Am I being cynical or is this the same script they used on Saddam, Slobodan et al? Is it corroborated fact that these appalling bombing and strafing sorties took place in the manner we are being told they took place? How many tweets are genuine? Where is the video evidence?

And why the sudden rush to the ICC? Haven't seen Bush & Co there yet...

Smelly._________________"We will lead every revolution against us!" - attrib: Theodor Herzl

... ... ...Hague, the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, and the EU foreign affairs chief, Lady Ashton, are due to fly to Geneva on Monday to promote the case for prosecutions of Libyan leaders by the international criminal court. The foreign secretary said: "The message is clear: that there will be a day of reckoning for those guilty of the appalling atrocities. The world will act together to hold them to account."

Such measures were decried as paltry by some organisations calling for immediate action to stop the bloodshed. ... ... ...

Am I being cynical or is this the same script they used on Saddam, Slobodan et al? Is it corroborated fact that these appalling bombing and strafing sorties took place in the manner we are being told they took place? How many tweets are genuine? Where is the video evidence?

And why the sudden rush to the ICC? Haven't seen Bush & Co there yet...
Smelly.

Nor the Israeli War Criminals, for that mattter!_________________'And he (the devil) said to him: To thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them'. Luke IV 5-7.

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